"When the Giants Come to Town..." is my blog intended to chronicle my thoughts on San Francisco Giants baseball. My special interest is in prospects and the farm system, but of course, will comment on all aspects of the San Francisco Giants. I will also comment on baseball in general, particularly from a fantasy baseball perspective. I hope you will find the site informative, and invite you to join in the discussion.

Sunday, December 14, 2014

Scouting the 2015 Draft: Carson Fulmer

Carson Fulmer is a hard throwing RHP for Vanderbilt who split time between closing and starting last year. He will probably start for Vandy in 2015. He could project as either a starter or reliever in the pros. He is compact, but solidly built at 5'11", 195 lbs. He generates tremendous arm speed with a quick, jerky windup with rather abrupt acceleration and deceleration with quite a bit of effort. The arm speed produces a FB that goes 92-96 and has touched 97 MPH. He also has above average CB and CH to go with it. Here is his stat line from 2014:

7-1, 1.98, 91 IP, 41 BB, 95 K, 10 Saves.

His windup and delivery looks more like a reliever's to me, and I wonder about his injury risk with the abruptness of the arm speed, but his pitch mix would work as a starter. The comp that comes to me is Roy Oswalt. He is the exact same size as another Vandy alum, Sonny Gray. Fulmer has much more jerky and abrupt mechanics than Gray. BA has him ranked as the #13 draft prospect for 2015 while Kiley McDaniel of Fangraphs has him at #17.

8 comments:

Hey DrB. I dunno if you mind me furnishing a link on here. I had just looked into Carson Fulmer last week. This page compiled some reports on him on: macksmets.blogspot.com/2014/09/2015-draft-profile-rhp-carson-fulmer.html

There is a short video at the bottom, it starts with him batting. Last half shows him pitching, but only from a 3B view. Ranked pretty high by most, although Fangraphs put him at #17 and MLB Prospect Guide gave him an "a/b" grade. I see a chance he'd still be available. But we all know, 2015 performance will dictate a lot of shuffling in the draft order/rankings. Cheers.

We are starting to get into some names that may well be there at #19 for the Giants with the caveat, as you noted that there will likely be significant movement in the rankings by the time of the draft.

This is looking like a great draft to be in the late teen rankings. At this juncture there is no clear #1 or even clear top tier, but there is solid talent all the way to #30 and beyond.

I would not want to be holding the #1 overall and have to pay that kind of bonus money.

Yeah, the #1 pick doesn't seem to offer much assurance for an elite talent right now. But maybe somebody emerges? Dunno. It seems to me, the talent cluster is at the high borderline of very good. Meaning, middle (to low-ish) floors, but some very high ceilings. Lots of depth in that range. IMO, the 2014 draft had lots of depth toward the lower edge of excellent. (mid-high floors and high ceilings). But I'm not a guy who follows draft prospects as much. I prefer to follow guys already in pro ball. I can only allocate so much time/effort/interest, you know?

I do recall lots of chatter from the 2014 Under Armor All-America game at Wrigley. Mostly because we played there right afterward. The HR Derby was supposedly a fireworks display. 16 year-old Franklin Reyes. Chris Betts put something like 3 in a row onto Waveland Ave (beyond LF). Luken Baker and Starling Heredia hit bombs off the Toyota sign in LCF. I think maybe Ben Badler tweeted he'd never seen a single (MLB) player ever hit that sign before. And Josh Naylor reportedly sent one over the RF fence that landed among the trees!

Sounds like Betts (C/1B), Naylor (1B/OF), and Baker (RHP/OF) should be draft eligible... However, I do think there's a real chance we sign Shields. So I wouldn't fall in love with that 19th pick. Maybe for our comp pick? Thanks Panda. lol.

I still for the life of me can't understand how Trea Turner fell all the way to #13 last summer! Cray. If only... that ONE, singular position... Oh wow. For the record, I also liked Aaron Nola, who a lot of 'experts' projected to be available for us. so, go figure. lol.

108 mph off the bat of Josh Naylor? Sick.Luken Baker can pump 95 mph, has a slider, and is a two-way player with massive power? High schooler. Wow.

I do think our comp pick would give us a *very* strong lottery ticket. That #30-ish draft slot should offer high upside talent remaining. Most likely a bat, from my early review of the landscape. Yeah, to #30 and beyond, but I dunno about all the way down to our 2nd round. You mention the bonus money, that would be another penalty of losing our 1st rounder. Cheers.

Personally, I am keeping my fingers crossed that the Giants do not sign Shields. I want that draft pick! No, it's not a sure thing, but you never know when you will get a Matt Cain or Joe Panik, or when a higher level talent like Beede will fall into your lap.

Furthermore, with the Giants' having only a middling farm system, albeit startlingly productive in some areas, and being too strong a team to get an enviable draft lottery position, forfeiting draft picks seems foolhardy. Most plainly, as DrB says, the team may get a Cain, Panik, or Beede. But bloggers on this site have also worried that the Giants don't have enough trade chips in the minors, players coveted by other teams who nevertheless could be let go without gutting the system's depth.

I'm glad Melky is putting on milk-white socks rather than orange and black ones, for this reason, and I too hope we can avoid Shields in searching for a winning innings-eater. The travails of Timmy and the age of Hudson's arm may make the innings as important as the winning, or nearly so. A six-man set of starters, to be flexibly deployed rather than a strict rotation, to include the five pitchers of 2014 plus Cain?

About Me

I grew up in Northern California near the Napa Valley. I got interested in baseball and the Giants by listening to Russ Hodges and Lon Simmons broadcast Giants games on KSFO. My early heros were Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal and a guy you don't always think of, Jim Ray Hart. When I got older and was in school and early career, I didn't have time to follow as closely, but I tried to look up their boxscores each day and catch an occasional game on TV. One habit I got into at an early age was looking up the stats of their minor league players in The Sporting News. That became more difficult as TSN moved away from comprehensive baseball coverage. Now, of course, technology and affluence has changed all that. The internet is teaming with farm system/minor league information as well as college and high school baseball. Satellite TV enables me to get most of the Giants games on TV. I'm married with 2 wonderful daughters, who like to watch games with me.